I thought we lived in the city!!!

Happy Memorial Day!

Sunday afternoon several of the neighbors came over to watch/listen to the LSU game, eat & swim. The rain missed us again but there was some thunder & lightening. We need rain.  Not that I wanted it to rain on our party but if everyone has to get out of the pool anyway, it might as well rain. Once the thunder & lightening stopped, the sun never came back out. Oh well! Here's Dean & Amelia-Ann chillin'.

This little butterfly landed on Sheri's hat & stayed there for the longest time!

We had a great day. After several hours of playing ball, rain delay, playing more ball, lightening delay & playing more ball, LSU won! 2010 SEC Tournament Champions. It really doesn't mean all that much but at least they seem to be back to their winning ways. I was right about something. LSU will not be playing at home next weekend. For the first time since 1989 they will travel  for Regionals. They will be in the beautiful, sunny state of California! I soooo want to go. They're playing at UCLA. I love L.A. Granted, I've only been there once but I so loved it. Unfortunately, we will not be making the trip. Flights at this late date are ridiculously expensive. Not to mention the fact that I'm going to San Diego at the end of June. We'll just have to listen. This weekends games will not be on TV.

This morning me, Allie, Amelia-Ann & Sheri went & had mani's & pedi's. I went to yet another new place. I think it's my favorite. I know I've said that before but this place has a HUGE selection of polish. I think they have every single color that OPI ever made. It was a bit overwhelming. I ended up with Strawberry Margarita. It's hot pink. I really like it. After our mani's & pedi's we went out for lunch. We went to DeAngelos for pizza & salad. It was sooo good! When we left it was storming & much to our surprise it was actually raining at our house too! Woo Hoo!

It was such a relaxing way to spend the day until about 4:00. I was standing in the kitchen reading Dean an email when he said "Oh, that's a big snake" & as I start to turn around he says "don't look". Um yeh right. Tell me not to look & what do you think I'm going to do? This is what I saw.

Do you see it? YUCK! Dean went outside to try to kill it. Yes, I know there are lots of good snakes & all of that but at my house there's no such thing. Sorry. If you're a member of PETA you're going to want to stop reading now. Besides, from what Dean had seen of him he thought it was a Water Moccasin. So Dean goes to the get the shovel & the stupid snake slivers into the rock garden. Just yesterday, I was thinking I needed to thin out the day lily's. Dean could see it & he saw Dean so we were at a stalemate. I say "we" meaning Dean. I was inside looking out the window. They stared each other down for a bit & then Dean went to get the rake. His thinking was that he could hold him in place with the rake & stab him with the shovel. After a few more minutes Dean attempted to slice him in half. He missed but he did manage to chase him out of the rock garden.

That would be a rock next to him that Dean threw to try to get him out from under my truck. I did go outside but I'm not anywhere near this creature. I have a good zoom lens on my camera. Throwing rocks didn't work. Next step? Spray water at him. Dean has a shovel in one hand, the rake in the other & he tells me to spray the water at him. Hopefully, he'll come out from under the truck. Yeh, not so much. I suggested that we run over him with the truck. Dean said no for me to just stay right where I was. No problemo. Dean got the thingy that we use to scoop leaves out of the pool. It has a really long handle. He poked at him & got him out from under the truck.  Now he's up against the house. I think the snake is smarter than we are because he went from one place to another that Dean couldn't get to him with that shovel. Then back under the truck he goes. Enough of this. Dean told me to climb in the back of my truck & try to run over him. It's a really good thing I have an Expedition as this wasn't hard to do. I just climbed in through the back & climbed over the back seat & console while Dean kept an eye on the snake. The whole time I'm doing this I keep thinking of Lucy & Ethel.  This soooo seemed like something they'd be doing. Isn't it weird the things you think of in times like this? The snake was by my front tire. You'd think when I started the truck it would've scared the snake. Not this one. He just laid there. I backed up & missed him. Apparently, by just a hair. Back into the rock garden he went. I was beginning to think we needed Billy the Exterminator! Finally, Dean whacked at him with the shovel & got him! Sort of. He came flying out of the rock garden onto the carport. I was still in my truck. I figured if worse came to worse I could hit him if he got loose again. Once he was in the open space of the carport Dean was able to get him good with the shovel.

That's his head. Much to my chagrin, it was still attached to his body & it was still moving. He was still opening his mouth & doing that thing they do with their tongue. I didn't know it took so much to kill a snake. 

Here he is with the measuring tape. His head is still moving! How, I don't know, after the way Dean kept jabbing him with the shovel. He measured about 36 inches. He sure looked longer than that. It was a Water Moccasin too. YUCK YUCK YUCK!!

This brings me back to last summer when I saw a snake while watering plants. Of course nobody else was around & everyone thought I was exaggerating when I described what I saw. FYI, it looked just like this stupid snake!